Prologue: Legends of Old...
Years for the game are in BCE and CE (Before Current Era and Current Era) with the dividing date being the day Erdrick returned Light to the world. This is "history" as would be known by pretty much any player character Around - 50ish BCE: A Great Evil descends on Alfegard, darkening the skies until the sun goes unseen. Mankind is enslaved to its will and monsters run ravenously wild. Around 5 BCE to 0 CE: The Great Hero, Erdrick, is sent from the Heavens by the gods to free mankind from the oppression of the Great Evil. With the aid of the Gods, Erdrick formed the Rainbow Bridge allowing passage to Devil's Island, where Erdrick used the Ball Of Light to defeat the Great Evil and bring light back to the world. ~20ish CE: After Erdrick's passing, there was bickering among Erdrick's children about what to do with the sacred relics left in their charge. Erdrick's eldest son, Alecto, thought they should be sealed away to safeguard them against future need. Albriecht, Erdrick's youngest son, thought that they should take up Erdrick's mantle as Heroes and use the relics to fight the forces of evil still present in the world. ~25ish CE: Albriecht rallies the people of Rimuldar around his banner, seeking to overthrow the King and supplant him, his claim based on the fact that he was best suited to lead and protect the people if he assumed the Hero's mantle. Alecto and Fenrir oppose Albreicht, aiding the King's armies. This civil war ends when Albriecht dies. Ever since then, Albriecht's branch of the Hero's line has been viewed with suspicion, Albriecht being considered the "Black Seed from the Hero's tree". ~25 CE to 400 CE: Peace mostly reins over the world. Haukness becomes Alfegard's primary trading city since it is the only place with a deepwater bay to dock large ships anywhere on the continent. It also becomes a center of high learning, with Alecto personally establishing the Ivory Towers University of Magic there. Cantlin somehow develops its own unique branch of magic, combining sorcery and clockwork machinery to create powerful servants. Not the least of these is a powerful Golem, a creature composed of stone and clay given life by their magic to guard the city. During this time, monsterkind exists more or less peacefully with humans. The magic for Control Torcs is perfected allowing humans to tame monster companions. The United Slime Parcel Service is created when it is realized slimes possess the uncanny ability to track down a given target with 100% accuracy without fail, leading to slime couriers being a common sight. More dangerous monsters exist but mostly along the fringes of the civilised world, seemingly content to life and let live. Sure, there's the occasional rampage during a Dire Bear migration or when famine strikes forcing Rainhawks to seek alternate food sources but it isn't anything NEAR the levels seen during Erdrick's days. 400 CE: The Dragonlord and cohorts descend upon Haukness, burning it to the very bedrock. The devastation was complete. However, Alfegardians are a hardy folk and with the help of the dwarven mines in the Rocky Mountain Caves the city was rebuilt and restored to its former glory as a place of commerce and learning. 430 CE: Communication with Cantlin suddenly ceases completely. The other cities are left unsure as to why, since everything had been pretty peaceful until that point. King Steve assumes the worst and sends a scouting party to see if it has been wiped from the face of the earth. The scouting team, led by Lieutenant Rupert and his company, found that far from being destroyed it seemed Cantlin was gearing up for war. Their clockwork servants had been converted to clockwork soldiers. Rituals most foul were being performed. They learned a cabal calling themselves Order Mechanus had captured the children of the citizens of Cantlin and were forcing them to build an army, so they could spread the word of the One True Machine by force. King Steve declared war on them and the bloodiest fighting in centuries broke out. In the end, Order Mechanus was broken and driven into the mountains. 435 CE: The Dragonlord attacks Tantengel Castle, stealing the Ball Of Light from the royal treasury and kidnapping Princess Gwendolin. King Steve orders his forces to make haste to Devil's Island but they meet stiff resistance in the Rimuldar region, resulting in a stalemate between forces. Haukness was leveled once again the same night the Dragonlord attacked Tantengel. There were no known survivors As of 435 CE, monster attacks have become more and more frequent to the point where anyone outside of a large town can expect to potentially be attacked daily or even multiple times per day. As a result, humanity has slowly been pushed in towards its largest communities 440 CE: The King, getting desperate, puts out a call to the descendants of the Great Hero, Erdrick, asking them to come to the kingdom's aid in its time of need. Many folk, including Shaft, Traj, and Star eventually heed his call...